Re: The Total War Warhammer trilogy has been a total success for the TW series
Success for whom? If you mean for each of us specifically, I'm personally not happy with it. First and foremost, I'm not interested in fantasy, so I'm obviously not a fan of the new direction. Not very fond of some of the new mechanics either. Overpowered lords and monsters don't seem appropriate for a supposedly strategy based game and I'm worried they may also contaminate the future historical games. The same applies for quite a few battle mechanics (some of which were actually introduced in Rome II), such as the life-bar for every unit, the ever-increasing importance of stats and the role of traits and retinue as simple modifiers. All the above harm the tactical aspect, in my opinion. Finally, although the special faction mechanics have been universally acclaimed, I frankly dislike them. They may make sense in a fantasy setting, but CA has also been using them in semi-historical Total War games, like Troy and Three Kingdoms. In a hypothetical Medieval III or Empire III, however, I would hate it if France or Portugal or the Ottomans have a special resource, like "Authority" or "Trade outposts" or "timars" or whatever. Looks to me like a sloppy attempt to add flavour for each faction in an immersion-breaking manner.
If you mean CA, then it have been a success, although its dimensions have been exaggerated by the community. In terms of pre-orders, Warhammer I and II actually actually proved disappointing. The first game sold slightly less than Rome II (one million copies, approximately) and the second game did even worse (700.000). Even worse, the cover-up between owners of Rome II and the Warhammer games was also smaller than expected. If we also take into account the huge cut (according to a former CA employee) Games Workshop gets, the net profit for CA must have been lower than usual. The situation has improved substantially since then, thanks to the rising quality of the DLCs, the updating of the older races and the sheer size and variety of the combined maps. Warhammer III outclassed its predecessors, but I still wouldn't call it an unprecedented success. Even if we exclude Troy, which was completely free in release, Three Kingdoms still sold more and in that case Creative Assembly wasn't forced to share its revenue with anybody. Still, the partnership turned out to be profitable and there are strong hints that a new Warhammer-inspired game is on the works. Perhaps a strategy game taking place in the 40K universe or maybe a classic Warhammer game, but based on a different genre (RPG is the strongest candidate, I guess).